I would like to know how HSA with Linux will improve performance and rendering of videos and photos?
Will there be software that supports this function?
The technology sounds interesting when it's presented to me, but I have yet to see any videos that demonstrate the functionality that I wish to see.
http://www.luxrender.net/en_GB/index
That should provide you with the answers you're looking for I think, but if there are any other things, make sure to post them. It's just a very extensive matter, and it's not really possible to give a short overview of all the OpenCL acceleration applications in Linux, because there are so much of them.
Is there a Linux operating system that supports HSA?
fedora?
It isn't the about what distro. It is all about Kernel version. If the kernel is above 3.16 you should be fine.
Drivers are built into the Kernel in Linux.
There is some FOSS software that has HSA support but remember this is all very bleeding edge tech.
Is there any Linux kernel based operating system that doesn't support HSA lol?
*nix based operating systems are the only ones that have the tools necessary for custom scaling and job distribution. I think that HSA applications at this moment only run on GNU/Linux, I don't think there is any HSA application for any other operating system.
Don't you need proprietary drivers for HSA support anymore?
Dammit, You posted that while I was typing lol
This is true, for non-AMD users, it's probably necessary to have a really bleeding edge kernel to use the Intel Beignet features, as limited as they might be. OpenCL on AMD has been available for a while though, I don't think there are any major distros around (well, maybe Debian Stable...) that still run such an old kernel that OpenCL on AMD isn't available. For nVidia GPU users, there is nothing in terms of OpenCL, nVidia has only CUDA, which is propietary, and which doesn't support OpenMP, and even support for OpenACC (which isn't that "open") is very basic, so even if you would be able to target OpenACC using an alternative compiler like LLVM/Clang, you wouldn't really benefit very much. At this time, I think only AMD GP-GPU's support a usable feature set for an efficiency boost in HSA optimized applications. The performance gains are quite spectacular, and applications that use OpenCL (and OpenMP for scaled systems), have been available for a couple of years, and are pretty stable and proven at this point. These applications are mostly number crunching applications for scientific research and engineering.
The first "consumer applications" though - besides the miners that is - are popping up also, like Darktable 5, which is just now out this week, and it definitely sets a new standard for photo editing applications, outclassing anything on the market. The HSA feature set is pretty limited, and it also supports CUDA, but in the future, community development will probably add features that add extra OpenCL features, even if those will then only be available on AMD and maybe Intel if Intel finally comes through with Beignet.
Nope.
Actualy, there is a "kind of" HSA application for Windows also. The only application that actually works and is released, is the video stabilization application from AMD, which is the only acceleration application in terms of video for the consumer level that I know of that actually improves image quality instead of degrading it, but there is the potential to developing other HSA applications for Windows, as there has been an HSA tool kit available for free from AMD for a couple of years now. It's just that nobody seems interested in developing an HSA application for Windows or Mac, only for GNU/Linux. Maybe that has to do with the power of the Wintel alliance, maybe that has to do with the fact that the people that use HSA the most don't use software consoles anyway, but it's there if someone would actually develop it.
HSA for darktable? I really need to get off my ass and switch to team red.
Yeah, well, it's not that spectacular, and I think the entire core dev team of Darktable is actually on Intel/nVidia lol, but it's a start. Darktable 5 is really nice though, those that say that Lightroom is still better, really need to get professional help lol...
Is there any Linux kernel based operating system that doesn't support HSA lol?
I don't know what to say, I'm here asking questions about HSA is I want to find out more about it. I'm sure my question sounded funny, but I want to learn about HSA.
I read Zoltan's posts on other discussions around the forum about Linux and HSA. The whole thing sounded like it was the greatest thing since sliced bread.
I thought Linux and HSA where the future of computing so I thought that someday I would have to switch over to Linux.
HSA is a broad term. It's definitely the future of computing, and yes, you need linux to use it lol, any GNU/Linux distro.